As the boys’ varsity and junior varsity cross-country teams crossed the finish line of the New England Preparatory School Athletic Council (NEPSAC) meet in Thompson, Connecticut and received the results, they knew they had achieved something monumental in the School’s history.
The Gators traveled to Marianopolis Prep last Friday to compete in the NEPSTA meet—their most significant race of the season. As the boys’ cross country team’s final race, the group was determined to make it a memorable and fitting conclusion to their season.
Competing against 26 NEPSAC division IV teams across New England, the varsity team was challenged with some of the best competition they’ve faced yet. Despite the competition, the Gators varsity program finished second in the meet, which is an all-time best in the program’s history.
Varsity runner Brooks Neufeld ’26 reflected on the adversity the team had faced in the past few years to get to this incredible feat.
“We had Brian [Gamble] a couple of years ago and when we lost him, there was a little bit of worry on if we could meet the same standard that we were at when he was here. But this year, we trained hard which led to a great performance at NEPSTA.” Neufeld said.
As the coach of the team, Coach Ted Barker-Hook has built his program from the ground up and pushed his runners to achieve incredible feats on the course. Neufeld touches on the impact Coach Barker-Hook had on the teams’ success this season:
“He preaches a lot of just dedication. You gotta really be committed to his team to perform well. He makes you do a lot of stuff, but if you take that stuff very seriously, and you really just try your best to get it done, you’ll see improvements.” Neufeld said.
Neufeld talks about the main principles Barker-Hook preached before the races motivating the runners to achieve their best:
“He emphasizes the importance of remembering that in cross country, you’re running by yourself. But when you come together and look at results in the end, it really comes down to how you perform to help your teammates and everyone do well as a whole.” Neufeld explained.
Barker-Hook ponders on the qualities that stood out about his team this year compared to others:
“What I think was different this year that we haven’t seen for a long time is we didn’t have any truly elite runners… What we did have is a big pack of good determined runners so there wasn’t much separation from our first to our sixth runner time-wise.” Barker Hook described.
Barker-Hook used this unorthodox team setup as an advantage for the team’s training, as he instilled the importance of team running to boost chemistry and morale:
“This year I tried harder than other years to have kids training as a pack, getting used to running together as a pack, pacing each other, encouraging each other, and as the year went as some of the kids grew fitter and moved closer to our lead pack.” Barker-Hook said.
Barker-Hook believes that this team’s success will propel the team’s confidence heading into the coming years:
“I think when you can see this kind of success without having a superstar, it gives everyone who is a strong but not necessarily legendary runner a good chance to see that they can really matter and do something special.” Barker-Hook emphasized.
Not only did the varsity team find historic success on the varsity side, but the junior varsity team showed promise as well, defending their JV title by finishing first in the NEPSTA race for all JV teams in division IV.
Barker-Hook was impressed by his JV team’s success and views it as a way to drive his team for the future:
“They may be JV right now when we’re forced to create a varsity and JV team, but they are not JV forever. They had some great times running the same course as the varsity, and I think it can give them a ton of confidence and a ton of reason to keep on going.” Barker-Hook explained.
As the cross country season comes to a close, the “big, green, running machine” achieved the best year in team history, and are eager to build on this year’s foundations in the following years.
